A Colorado Springs couple exchanged vows at the Norris Penrose Events Center this week, choosing the grounds of the Pikes Peak or Bust Rodeo as the setting for their wedding — a place that brought them together nearly a decade ago.
As the Pikes Peak or Bust Rodeo prepared for the second pool of contests to perform on Thursday night for the National Finals Rodeo Open, the groom married the love of his life. The couple did not walk down an aisle but rather rode together in a wagon, stated their vows, and said "I do" in the heart of their chosen chapel at the Norris Penrose Events Center, in the presence of the rodeo family the bride had formed over nine years and the groom over 18.
The groom said he started as a volunteer at the rodeo in 2008 and fell in love with the people there — the board, the volunteers, and the contestants. He volunteered as a then-active-duty member of the Air Force, responsible for coordinating volunteers from varying branches of the armed forces for the rodeo each night. While he thought he was stepping into a one-and-done situation, he gravitated to the quality of people who surround the rodeo, which has been a part of life in Colorado Springs since 1937.
He retired from the Air Force and continued working with the rodeo over the years, during which the event left and returned to the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, became the NFR Open with a $1 million purse in 2022, and expanded from five performances to seven. He grew from a volunteer to vice president of the board of directors for the PPOBR.
The romance began not with a formal introduction but with a practical problem. The bride manages Tayco Screen Printing and Embroidery, located in downtown Colorado Springs, and nine years ago she began making the rodeo shirts and clothing sold at the Pikes Peak or Bust. The groom, working in the concourse that year and not yet on the board, said his feet were hurting from being on them all day, and her merchandise booth had a chair — so he kept sitting down, and the two kept talking. "Over the course of a week I thought, 'You know, I think this girl's interesting,'" he said.
The groom is set to become the PPOBR's board president in September, a role that will require his full attention, meaning the couple will wait one more year before a honeymoon. He said he asked his new wife to give him 15 months to get through his next busy year as rodeo president, with a promise that after the 2027 rodeo they would go wherever she wants to go.
The groom said the rodeo's mission goes beyond putting on a show, describing it as twofold: promoting Western heritage and supporting the local military, with proceeds after bills are paid going back to military organizations in the community for quality-of-life needs of service members.
The groom's transition to board president in September will mark his next chapter with the organization, and how that leadership shapes the rodeo's upcoming season remains to be seen.